Harry Hawker – The Man Behind the Name

Realizing that there was little chance of achieving this ambition in Australia, Harry decided to travel to England, and sailed there in 1911. After some months of difficulty in obtaining suitable employment Harry was eventually able to secure a job as a mechanic with the fledgling Sopwith Aviation Company. His career in aviation had started. Within a few weeks of joining Sopwiths, Harry asked the founder of the company, Tom Sopwith, if he could teach him to fly. When Tom asked him what he would do if he crashed or damaged the frail airplane Harry’s reply was to pull $50 (Aus$100) out of his sock, which he had been saving for a return ticket to Australia should he ever need it. In those days, flying tuition was short and brief. Within four days of his first lesson he was allowed to fly solo and immediately undertook a 50 minute flight. He learned fast and it did not take long for Tom Sopwith to realize that Harry was a gifted pilot. A month after his first flight he was awarded his ‘Aviator’s Certificate’, the equivalent to today’s pilot’s license.

Harry was promoted to being in charge of the hangars and also of all competition, demonstration and test flying. Quite an achievement for a 20 year old who had only been with the company for a matter of weeks and who had only just learned to fly! By the time the First World War broke out in 1914 Harry Hawker had achieved fame as a record breaking pilot. His experiences, and the results of how his airplanes performed, all helped in developing and improving aircraft design, at a time when advancement in aviation was really a matter of trial and error. One of the many advancements for which Harry could claim a degree of credit was the change from wing warping, as a means of lateral control, to the use of ailerons.

During the early part of 1914 he had returned to Australia for a few months and had enjoyed a hero’s welcome. The fame of his flying successes in England were well known to the Australian public and during his short visit to his home country he did much to advance the cause of aviation and change the perception of flying being a ‘daredevil’ sport to one of being a skilled profession. His time back in Australia was spent giving demonstration and pleasure flights to people who, for the most part, had probably never even seen an aircraft fly. During one flight, in which he was attempting to break the height record, and succeeded by reaching an altitude of 7800 feet, he had an unfortunate mishap on landing when his engine stopped at 300 feet and he crashed in a plowed field, thankfully with no personal injury to himself.

After repairs the aircraft was made airworthy and Harry prepared to start giving demonstration flights once more. However luck must have deserted him because on his very next flight in the repaired machine he hit a hurdle when landing on the racecourse that he was using as an airfield. Again Harry was able to walk away from the crash, probably saved from injury due to the flimsy structure of the airplane absorbing the impact. This time he decided to return with his damaged aircraft to England. After his arrival back in England during the summer of 1914 Harry took to the air again, demonstrating his aerobatic abilities to enthralled crowds. Crashes were common, but luckily injuries were not.

With the onset of the First World War, Sopwiths turned to the design and production of military aircraft and Harry, in his capacity as chief test pilot, had a lot of flying to do. However with the need to open up new aircraft production facilities to meet the needs of wartime demands Harry also found himself traveling around Britain visiting the various factories and supervising construction standards. Sopwiths became famous for their fighter aircraft, in particular the Camel and the Pup. The Camel was in fact probably the best known of all aircraft during the war and Harry Hawker was largely responsible for its design.

In 1918 Harry decided to try and win the £10,000 ($20,000) prize which an English newspaper was offering to the first person who successfully flew across the Atlantic nonstop. Sopwiths specially modified one of their larger two seat aircraft, including adapting a detachable section of fuselage which could be used as a boat should the aircraft be forced into the sea enroute. The attempt was to be made from Newfoundland in Canada to England, thereby taking advantage of the prevailing winds. In the event the attempt failed. Appalling weather and engine cooling problems eventually forced Harry and his navigator to decide that they would have to put the aeroplane down in the Atlantic. By sheer chance they spotted a ship and were able to ditch nearby, enabling them to be rescued safely. In spite of the failure of his attempt Harry Hawker returned to England to a hero’s welcome and a service decoration from the King.

As well as flying Harry began to take an interest in car racing. With little test flying to be done following the end of the war and the reduction in the numbers of aircraft being built he found time to race various cars including Daimlers, Mercedes and Sunbeams. It soon became a passion for him. Anything to do with speed interested him and at one time he even found himself racing power boats.

In 1920 the Sopwith company closed down as a result of financial difficulties which followed the cancellation of government contracts when the war ended. This led to Harry establishing the H.G. Hawker Engineering Company which included a number of ex Sopwith directors on its board including Tom Sopwith himself. The new company took over the rights to Sopwith’s aircraft, cars and other engineering products. By diversifying into other products Hawkers were able to ride out the recession, making everything from motorcycles to saucepans.

In 1921 Harry agreed to fly in the annual Aerial Derby piloting a Nieuport Goshawk racing aircraft and on the evening of July 12 1921 he took off for a test flight in the aircraft. A short time later the aircraft caught fire and crashed, killing Harry Hawker. His death was a tragic blow not only to his adopted country, England, but also in his homeland, Australia. Tributes came from everywhere including the King and the Prime Minister.

However Hawker’s name was to live on. His old colleague Tom Sopwith took over the running of Hawker Engineering, and the company went from strength to strength. In 1933 the company changed its name to Hawker Aircraft Ltd and in 1935 it joined Armstrong Siddeley to form the Hawker Siddeley Aircraft Company. During the Second World War Hawkers was renowned for its Hurricane fighter which had first flown in 1937. Some 15,000 were eventually built and it played a key role in the Battle of Britain in 1940. Postwar designs of the company included the very successful Hawker Hunter which sold to many overseas air arms and indeed has only just retired from the Swiss air force. In the late 1950s the company started to look at the possibilities of vertical takeoff aircraft. Their work culminated in the Hawker Harrier, a unique design which introduced a whole new set of principles into air combat flying. The Harrier, nicknamed the Jump Jet, continues to turn heads at airshows and advanced versions are in service with the Spanish Navy, the Royal Air Force, and the United States Marine Corps.

In 1960 Hawker Siddeley absorbed several other companies that made up the British aircraft industry at the time. One of these was the long established and famous de Havilland Aircraft Company, noted for its range of light aircraft in the 1920s and ’30s, the Mosquito of the Second World War, and the Comet, the world’s first civil jet airliner. At the time of its integration into Hawker Siddeley, de Havilland was working on the world’s first specifically designed business jet, the DH.125. With the change in company ownership aircraft designations also changed and the DH.125 became the Hawker Siddeley HS.125. As the 125 began to sell around the world operators found the name of the aircraft a bit cumbersome and in America particularly it tended to be shortened to a more simple “Hawker”.

When, in 1977 British Aerospace was created to take over virtually all of the aircraft manufacturing companies in the United Kingdom, the official designation of the aircraft also changed and the HS.125 became the British Aerospace BAe 125. However operators of the aircraft continued to affectionately call it the Hawker. Finally with Raytheon’s acquisition of the 125 program from British Aerospace in 1993 it was decided that if the market wanted to call the 125 a Hawker then that’s just what it should be called. Hawker Siddeley, which still exists as a diverse engineering company albeit no longer in aircraft manufacturing, allowed Raytheon to formally name its successful 125 business jet “Hawker” and market it as such. (Incidentally, Hawker Siddeley owns the Australian distributor of Raytheon Aircraft, including the Hawker Pacific.)

And so, just over 100 years after the birth of a man who changed the face of aviation, his name lives on, associated with an aircraft which has become the best selling mid-sized business jet in the world.